Author: globeskimmer

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‘Cause every night I lie in bed
The brightest colors fill my head
A million dreams are keeping me awake
I think of what the world could be
A vision of the one I see
A million dreams is all it’s gonna take
A million dreams for the world we’re gonna make

I was in a taxi when this song came on. I listened and keenly felt its lyrical and profound simplicity. The Self-Healing Journeys I am shaping are turning out to be the way I envision them to be. Or rather we envision them to be.

My wonderful partner, an elementary school English and music teacher, has been gifting music classes to orphans whenever she is in the ancient city of Kathmandu. I found myself saying to her, well, let’s add yoga with the children at the orphanage to our program. It is the most natural thing to do.

Call it divine alignment. Giving back is close to my heart. Most of my adult life, I have been a dedicated volunteer with various Non-Governmental Organizations, working mostly with disadvantaged women and the physically challenged. I believe in the goodness of the world. I believe we can touch one another’s heart and soul, support one another, and heal ourselves and the planet.

When I was called to pick up a Teacher Training in yoga, the first thing that came to my mind was children’s yoga. The spontaneity must have come from something so deep in me that knew. Who knew? I ended up with two certifications in Kundalini Yoga for children. Those training days were among the most catalyzing moments.

Trust life to send you exactly what’s needed for your growth and expansion. Always at the perfect time. Rarely the manner you imagined them to be.

Part of the journey is to recognize and trust guidance.

In light of this, our Retreats now include an evening of joyful yoga with children at orphanages we work closely with. Yoga with children is 90 percent play with fearless young ones and 200 percent inner-child fun for weary adults who can learn to let go of control and certainly shed a mask or two.

Time with the children is of course optional, but it will be so lovely to have you join us.

To add to this sweet synchronicity, my partner and I are on the same page as far as conscious living is concerned. Our cotton-hemp yoga mats and carriers are consciously sourced and locally made. The income goes directly to artisans who need them most.

Those who are aware of my past life as a social entrepreneur know I was working with disadvantaged communities in Cambodia and Laos, peddling sustainably made and Fairly Traded handicrafts and artisanal produce.

This turn of events is part beautiful unfolding, part life bringing me to back to where my heart is. True alignment happens when you are real and honest with your heart. One of the greatest gifts Kundalini Yoga is the embodiment of Truth. Sat means true, nam means you. Self-Healing Journeys is the product of listening to and manifesting what is authentic to me at soul level. Our Retreats are about empowering you with real life tools to self-heal, and about humanity and our interconnectivity.

Now a million dreams for the world we’re gonna make.

It is time to begin weaving yours.

Begin with us. Our Retreat dates for Self-Healing Journeys in Kathmandu and Pokhara through 2019 are available here.

Time surely has wings. A quarter of the year flew by. How has it been for you?

We’re right smack in the middle of the energy of expansion and growth, into what is most authentic at our soul level. This year has been nothing short of spectacular for me. It has been a profound time of healing and seismic shifts in the last weeks. It seems the answers I sought are finally visible in the cracks where light comes in.

It felt like all the tools I have been fervently polishing are sparkling. I now find myself returning to my center quicker as I sharpen my self-observation skills. I catch myself before I trip and fall into a downward spiral. I drop it.

The kind of “dropping it” I am talking about brings a sense of liberation. In this space, there is no struggle, no drama, just incredible peace.

The practice of just-dropping-it is simple yet so profound.

Letting go is a constant practice. Letting go is also a conscious moment of observing and rewiring habits and thought forms so change is sustainable.

Here’s what works for me and I want to share the practice I lean on.

For five days, I am going to show you life tools you can take home with you. I have put together a retreat to empower you with medicine you can have, for keeps, for the rest of your life. It is not just a feel-good, skim-the-surface vacation that leaves you wanting for the next holiday.

You will learn how to heal yourself with Reiki energy, breathe into your every cell and move every fiber of your being with simple and powerful exercises designed to fit into your busy lifestyle. All these amid the jaw-dropping landscape of the Himalayas.

This clarity and connection will always be accessible to you. You will return to real messy world with an arsenal of tools to live a deep and satisfying life.

Begin with me here.

Conscious humans must now take uncomfortable actions and become comfortable in the discomfort. – Guru Singh

The healing process of Reiki is likened to peeling an onion. Reiki energy unravels deeply rooted issues, bringing to light what needs to be released and healed. How deep Reiki energy works depends on the change you allow.

Many of us sleep-walk through lives. We mistake constant busyness for living. We fret excessively over our children, drink more wine after a long day at work, perhaps adopt a cat or two, embark on longer and longer jogs for an endorphin rush that’s a poor filler for emptiness. All this time, a discontent simmering in the cauldron, waiting for a trigger to bubble over.

We cannot help it we say. Hanging onto familiar and deeply entrenched habits is as safe as putting one foot after another. Our attachments are so comfortable they keep us stuck.

We put up with a lot because we expect life to be neat and tidy. We expect permanence.

We talk ourselves out of things our hearts want to say “Hell, Yes!” to. We become physically, mentally and emotionally exhausted from living on an autopilot mode. We pay good money to doctors, seeking one cure after another for malaise that refuses to be known and named because our stories are repressed deep in the recesses of our onion.  

The truth is, everything is impermanent. Life is messy and cannot be contained in a nicely wrapped parcel.

The other truth is, no amount of cold-pressed green juice or external therapy is going to heal you. Even if good heaven shines its light on you and you are fortuitous enough to find the best living doctor on this planet, it is still you doing the healing.

Yes, you. You are going to save you.

That perennial stiff neck, debilitating insomnia and chronic inflammation merely reflect the relationship you have with yourself. What layers are you willing to let go to get to the core of your being that knows exactly how to connect to your will? Where do you find the courage and strength to stand up for the things and experiences you want to have? How much of the onion skin would you allow yourself to shed?

The choice is yours, Dear One, to stay with what’s familiar and limiting, or weave a new story that’s different from tired ones you’re used to.

How do you fancy we begin peeling the onion and creating a new chapter together, one with more feeling and sensitivity? This is a weeklong self-healing retreat in the mountains this beautiful spring.

You can learn to heal yourself. You can learn to begin a practice that will nourish you from the inside. You can concoct your own sustainable medicine.

You will learn how to Reiki yourself. You will breathe into clarity. You will move your body in such a manner prana will flow like it never did. We will take long walks in the woods in between. You will return home with real life tools to navigate complex and beautiful life, and the Home that’s your heart knowing nothing can steal your life away from you.

We will begin together, amid the rugged beauty of the Himalayas.

Detail to come soon. If you are called, connect with me personally at connect@globeskimmer.com

One of the most profound thought form changes my yoga practice has brought is relinquishing the constant need to do things to make anything happen. I wouldn’t have believed if you told me I could relax and trust, that the thing I work so intensely for will show up at my door step.

Taking my hands off the steering wheel, letting go of how things should be for myself and those I care about never figured in my radar.

The perfect justification was I loved doing them. Like the song goes, life is what happens to you when you’re busy making plans. My changing and ageing physical body was however the best proof it didn’t appreciate my restlessness. It couldn’t keep up with my cognitive universe.

My teacher Sat Sarbat said “We see the world in terms of success or failure. We are unable to be. In ‘to be’ there’s no judgement. We’ve to do to perform. We’ve to get it. That’s what they taught us in school. Nobody taught ‘to be’ is not enough.”

Unlearning a lifetime of conditionings is a work in progress. Last week was one such unbecoming. I spent an insane week in a retreat deeply immersed in Gurdjieff Sacred Dance, navigating the paradox of staying relaxed yet awake, dancing spirit back into the present.

Gurdjieff Sacred Dance is not just a dance of letting go. It’s an incredibly powerful way to restructure and rewire The Mind.

Ancient teachings write that one can gain enlightenment in three ways: The Fakir tradition where you renounce everything and live through pain; the monastic way through devotion; and the way of the yogi by experience and knowledge. Gurdjieff’s work is said to be the Fourth Way.

Like Yogi Bhajan, Gurdjieff said there has to a practice for householders. We can no longer sit on nails or meditate in caves for 10 years. We have to live here and be conscious here.

And just like Kundalini Yoga as Taught by Yogi Bhajan, Gurdjieff’s work is confrontational to say the least.

Gurdjieff’s movements were designed to create frustration. Certainly frustration was an understatement. I was compelled to confront and break my own long-held mental patterns and habits. It was non-negotiable only because suffering was the other option. Staying stuck was not a very attractive place to be.

Sat Sarbat said, “Frustration is a side effect, not the objective. Because you break patterns in your brain, you’re helpless. You should welcome it.”

Truth be told, it took a few days to welcome non-control, to relax the over-controlling and over-rationalizing Intellectual Center, to fully grasp how the Mind, powerful as it is, did little to ease me into being in the present moment.

Many moments, I was frozen in place and in my head, orchestrating the next step. All that was needed was a split second of scheming the future, I missed three steps. I missed life.

Gurdjieff’s approach to movement deepened my insight into the mind-body-spirit connection. How to lean deeper into the most important relationship, the one with my own consciousness.

By fully allowing my body, the Moving Center, and heart space, the Emotional Center, to move with my all-powerful Intellectual Center, I flowed with structured chaos designed to confound and confront. I was awake and relaxed.

Being fully present is being alive. Effortlessly. The present is a resting place full of vitality and grace.

The purpose of these movements is not perfection. Sat Sarbat reiterated, it is to use pressure, joy, or frustration, to keep the capacity to observe it without saying “I did it,” or “I am sh*t, I can’t do it.”

“When you’re not hooked by the past, hooked by hope, therefore you can be in the moment where trinity [of I, Am, Me] can be in action.”

And I danced and danced with all my centers engaged, a misstep be damned, fully stepping into spirit with nary a force or denial.